Accenture’s long-term relationship with Ruukki, combined with lengthy experience helping metals and discrete manufacturing companies achieve high performance, made it the right consultancy for this critical undertaking.
To describe and quantify the need for change, Accenture began by helping Ruukki develop a detailed business case. This involved laying out a clear strategy and rationale for change; performing benchmarking studies; and developing key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure the effectiveness of forthcoming initiatives.
Accenture professionals from its mining and metals, manufacturing, finance and supply chain service lines then worked closely with Ruukki on several concurrent fronts. One involved the development of a state-of-the-art operating model: wholly new processes for sales and operations planning and order-to-cash.
Key to the success of this effort was Accenture’s use of the Supply Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) model to develop new processes for managing Ruukki’s core metals business and encouraging growth in its solution business. The undertaking was particularly tricky because the core metals and solutions businesses have different priorities: efficiency and delivery accuracy for the former, and flexibility, growth and partner-network support for the latter.
A second concurrent effort involved “network simplification”: analyzing Ruukki’s distribution network capabilities and recommending ways to minimize inventories, warehouse sites and expensive subcontracting initiatives. Toward this end, Accenture professionals made site visits and performed network analyses and optimization studies. They then developed network-composition recommendations geared to maximizing the competitiveness of each business, enhancing customer service and promoting companywide growth.
A series of workshops also were held to solicit input from Accenture point experts in various fields of expertise, and to keep decision makers throughout Ruukki up to date. Lastly, a transformation plan was formulated. Ruukki has actively executed the transformation plan and the first stage has been completed.